


the eternal perpetual question

by Nary



Category: Watchmen
Genre: Alcohol, First Time, Homophobia, M/M, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-19
Updated: 2009-12-19
Packaged: 2017-10-04 16:23:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/32151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nary/pseuds/Nary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was 3:43 AM.  It wasn't snowing, but it was cold enough to freeze piss on the sidewalk and the Comedian had just walked halfway across the Lower East Side, swearing up and down that they'd be able to get a drink under the table at this place he knew, because he knew the guy who owned the joint, and it was always open late if you knocked on the door the right way.  Except that it wasn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the eternal perpetual question

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cale/gifts).



"This bar appears to be closed."

"I noticed. Fuck."

It was 3:43 AM. It wasn't snowing, but it was cold enough to freeze piss on the sidewalk and the Comedian had just walked halfway across the Lower East Side, swearing up and down that they'd be able to get a drink under the table at this place he knew, because he knew the guy who owned the joint, and it was always open late if you knocked on the door the right way. Except that it wasn't. He'd pounded on the door until a lady with curlers stuck her head out the upstairs window and told him in no uncertain terms where he could go.

It was a shame, because the Comedian could really have used a drink. It had been a pretty rough night, even by his standards. Nite Owl had looked downright green, what you could see of him around the mask, and Rorschach… well, who knew what the hell that kid was thinking most of the time, but the Comedian had seen his hands shaking after. There had been two guys holding the girl down, one taking his turn, and the other one standing by, just watching, with his dick in his hand. As they mopped the floor with the bastards, Eddie noticed that Rorschach had taken particular care to kick the watcher in the face a couple of times.

Afterwards, Laurie had been shivering, and not just from the cold, although that probably didn't help. It pissed Eddie off that her mother would send her out in her skivvies on such a cold night, but what could he possibly say about it? "Hey Sally, your kid's freezing her ass off, let her put on some damn pants"? He was pretty sure that wouldn't go over well. After the ambulance pulled away with the girl in the back, Nite Owl had offered to run Laurie home, and she'd jumped at the chance.

"Good work tonight, kid," he'd told her, but she'd just given him her usual death-glare and walked away. Rape case. It figured. She wouldn't talk to him for a week now, never mind that he'd smashed one guy's face into a brick wall and dislocated another's shoulder, leaving him screaming on the ground. What the fuck ever, it was her problem, not his.

With the two of them gone, that left just him and Rorschach, and Eddie was hard up for a drink, so he'd set off. He'd never actually seen Rorschach drink, or eat, or do anything else that would require taking off that creepy mask, but the young guy had trailed along with him anyway, like he didn't have anywhere else to go. But the bar was closed and it was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey and he was standing in the middle of a deserted street at 3:48 in the morning with Rorschach.

"We could go to my place, I guess," the Comedian said grudgingly, feeling obligated to come up with something since he'd dragged the poor guy all the way to East 7th Street. "I've got some beer in the fridge." He tried not to make it sound real inviting. It always felt weird, going to someone's house and sitting around in masks, pretending like they were pals when most of them didn't even know each others' real names.

"That might constitute a breach of security," Rorschach said flatly.

"Why? It's not like my name's on the mailbox... Shit. I can never tell when you're joking."

"You're the Comedian," said Rorschach, and that time Eddie thought he caught a hint of a smile in the monotone voice. They started the walk toward Eddie's apartment, hands shoved deep into pockets and chins down against the wind.

Halfway there, a skinny girl with dyed red hair leaned out of an alley and waved them over. "Five dollars each, I'll take you both," she promised, before she noticed the masks and shrank back. Eddie caught her by one scrawny, track-marked arm. "Sorry, mister," she was babbling, "I didn't mean nothin'..."

"You wanna share?" he asked Rorschach over the whore's whining. "You one of those guys who gets hard after a fight?" Rorschach didn't answer, and the mask didn't give him any clue what the guy might be thinking. He wondered, not for the first time, how he even saw with it on. "Fuck it," Eddie muttered, and let the girl go, watched her run away on her too-high heels. She wasn't a real redhead anyway.

Almost there, they came across a bum, sitting on the relative warmth of a grate and slurring a song that had been old when Eddie was a kid. It gave him an idea. He marched up to the grizzled old man and poked him in the chest with a finger, hard enough to knock him back. "Hand over the booze, pal."

The wino looked up at him with bloodshot, frightened eyes. "Hey, I don' wan' any trouble, friend..."

"Then gimme the bottle and I won't run you in on a drunk and disorderly. Deal?"

The bottle changed hands, and they walked on. Eddie made sure to give the neck a good wipe before he took a swig. Fucking Ripple, tasted like a cough syrup and Clorox cocktail, but you couldn't really expect anything better, given the source. It'd do. He took another drink, then offered the bottle to Rorschach.

"Stolen liquor?"

"_Confiscated_," Eddie corrected him. "And technically it's wine. Or maybe rubbing alcohol and grape Kool-aid, it's hard to tell."

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe he needed it more than you?"

"No fucking way," said Eddie. "Not after tonight."

At 4:22, they rode the elevator up to his apartment in silence. Eddie had put away enough of the wine to give him a dull, warm glow and make him fumble with his keys, almost dropping the bottle. Rorschach took it out of his hands for safekeeping, and set it down on the kitchen table once they got inside. "Well, make yourself at home," Eddie told him. "Mi casa es su fucking casa." He flopped down on the battered couch, exhausted and yet knowing that he was too wired to sleep anytime soon.

"Why did you get into this line of work?" Rorschach asked him out of the blue, taking a seat at the table.

Eddie had to think about it for far too long. "Hard to remember," he said at length. "Start a bad habit young enough and maybe you can never kick it."

"Is it an acceptable channel for your anti-social impulses?"

The Comedian had to chuckle at that. "Fuck, if you haven't figured out yet that this gig isn't socially acceptable, you've got a lot to learn, kid. But yeah, I guess if I hadn't put on the mask, I'd be in prison by now."

"You enjoy punishing them."

"You mean, do I get off on it? Not like some guys do. Not like afterwards I have to go and jack off... well, not usually," he said with a hollow laugh. "No, I just... I don't know, sometimes it's all you can do to hold shit together. You gotta hit back."

"Even though it's not enough?" Rorschach's voice sounded strangely hopeful, as if he thought maybe the Comedian had the answers he was missing. It was a shame to disappoint the kid.

"It'll never be enough," he said. "So you take out one scumbag, mugger, dope fiend, gangbanger. Another one'll just take his place. And you can't do a damn thing about the scumbags who really fuck things up, the commies and the eggheads and the politicians. Sometimes you just gotta laugh about it, or you'll go crazy."

"Yes," said Rorschach, not laughing. He had pushed his mask up far enough to let him take a drink, his first. Eddie could see his lip, swollen from the fight, curved around the bottle's neck, the tight line of his jaw, dusted with copper stubble, the way his adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed the vile swill. _A redhead, huh_. It put ideas into his head. Bad, bad ideas. He'd never been a man to keep himself from acting on a bad idea. _Hell_, he thought, _if it doesn't work, at least it'll get him out of here._

"So, you wanna put the bottle down and come suck on something else?"

Rorschach sat there for an uncomfortably long time, so long that Eddie was starting to think he'd read the guy's needy puppy-dog behavior all wrong. Then he put the bottle down carefully, and nodded, just once. Once was enough.

It was 4:41 in the morning, and Rorschach was on his knees, sucking the Comedian's cock. Eddie had thought he might finally take the mask off, but he hadn't, just left it pushed up above his nose and mouth. Fine, everyone has their issues. Eddie slid his thumb under the edge of the mask, just once - latex? Jesus, how did he even _breathe_? - and got nipped on the hand as his reward, so he left it alone after that. The little faggot was good, anyway, working his tongue and hand together like a god-damn pro. There was no way he hadn't done this before. Maybe he'd been in prison. Hell, maybe he just liked cock. Eddie had wondered about him and his "partner", but he didn't get the queer vibe from Nite Owl - too straight-arrow, and Eddie was pretty sure he'd caught him checking out Laurie's ass once. Nothing wrong with that, it was a damn fine ass, but if he tried anything, the Comedian might just have to have a little talk with him... Fuck, shouldn't be thinking about his daughter's ass while he was getting a blowjob, but he couldn't deny the mental image got him hotter. Though he could spot 'em a mile away, Eddie wasn't queer, or at least not so that it counted. He just… wasn't picky.

He curled his hand at the back of Rorschach's neck, stroking the short, sweaty hair there, urging him faster. His tongue seemed to know just what Eddie wanted, teasing him as those punch-swollen lips circled his girth. He could feel Rorschach's warm spit running down him in rivulets, wetting his hair, over his balls, and he knew he wouldn't last much longer. He wanted to come on his face, so he pulled Rorschach up short just before he finished, leaving a white spurt of his own smeared across the flowing pattern of the mask.

Rorschach's mouth hung open, breathing hard, and he let it start to drip down onto his cheek before he raised a hand to wipe it away. Eddie found himself wishing for a second that he could see the other man's eyes, get a guess at what he was thinking. Was he hating him right now? Hating himself? "Why'd you do it?" he asked, not expecting an answer.

"You seemed lonely," Rorschach said.

"Fuck you," Eddie said, though he was unable to muster any real anger to put into it through the post-orgasm haze. "I can get laid whenever I want."

"Not by someone who understands you."

"You think you understand me? You don't know shit about me. You don't even know my real name."

Rorschach stood. "Don't need to. I know _you_."

He moved like he might turn to go, but Eddie caught him by the arm and pulled him back. "Don't think you're leaving just yet, kid," he told him as he pinned him down on the sofa. Rorschach could have fought back - his muscles were wiry, taut, and Eddie had been ready for a struggle, knew better than to underestimate the little sonofabitch - but he didn't, just lifted his hips so that Eddie could feel his dick pressing hard against his leg. Eddie didn't make a habit of sucking cock, but he knew how to handle one. He braced himself on one arm, leaving enough room between their bodies to reach down with his free hand. He liked hearing the sharp intake of breath when he stroked Rorschach over his pants, knowing how much better it would be once he was in there, skin on skin. "Beg for it," he told him, pressing down harder.

Rorschach practically whimpered, and Eddie could feel his cock twitching beneath the weight of his hand, but he didn't say a word. Stubborn little bastard. He popped the button on Rorschach's trousers and worked his hand inside, fingers grazing hot, soft skin, sliding down to grip him tight. A groan broke from Rorschach's throat, hoarse and ragged, and he pushed up into Eddie's grasp as if he couldn't help himself anymore, like he was lost. Eddie didn't kiss men, but right at that moment he found he wanted to touch those aching lips with his own. It was strangely gentle, no tongue or anything, but it still made Rorschach moan and buck against him even harder.

At 5:00 am on the dot, Rorschach came across Eddie's knuckles with a shudder that shook his whole body, gasping out something that might have been "Dan," or might have been "Dad." The Comedian didn't dare ask which. He just lay on top of him in silence and felt Rorschach's heart fluttering under his palm like an injured bird. It was the closest he'd felt to anyone in… he didn't know how long. Years.

"Let me up, Comedian," rasped Rorschach after a few moments.

"My name's Eddie," the Comedian whispered against his ear. He wasn't sure why he said it, except that seemed like it needed to be said.

"Then let me up, Eddie."

The first thing Rorschach did when he was set loose, even before he did up his fly, was fix his mask, drawing it snugly down over his chin, making himself into an enigma once more. It was unsettling to see that hint of humanity disappear with a single gesture. "I'll go," he said, turning away.

"You got somewhere to go to?" Eddie asked, wondering for the first time if Rorschach had a home. He couldn't imagine him with a family - he was pretty sure none of them had families, except Laurie - but he must have had an apartment somewhere. He tried to picture what it might look like, and failed.

Rorschach picked up his hat, tugged it down by the brim. "I've always got somewhere to go."

Outside, it had started snowing, fat flakes drifting down like ash, suspended in the yellow glow of the streetlight. At 5:04, the Comedian stood, looking out the window, and watched them melt.

"Darkness it was so near to me, i ask of shadow won't you have a drink?  
(the eternal perpetual question)  
Inside snugandevil. i was sitting in mcsorley's It,did not answer.  
outside.(it was New York and beautifully, snowing. . . ." - e.e. cummings


End file.
